Mexico is Expected to Legalize Medical Marijuana Soon

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto spoke during a special session regarding global strategies for the war on drugs. President Nieto stated that he is now in favor of legalizing medical marijuana in Mexico, and new regulations would be announced shortly after the conference. During the special session, he said that drug users should not be criminalized.

President Nieto, along with many other world leaders, agree that drug use should be considered a public health problem, Reuters reports. He stated that, “I am giving voice to those who have (in public forums) expressed the necessity of changing the regulatory framework to authorize the use of marijuana for medical and scientific purposes,” in regards to where Mexico stands on medical marijuana.

Mexico already had plans to legalize medical marijuana as a Senator commented, and is expected to be approved by May. Some Mexican government officials support increasing the legal amount of marijuana that people can possess for personal use as well.

President Nieto said, “We should be flexible to change that which has not yielded results, the paradigm based essentially in prohibitionism, the so-called ‘War on Drugs’… (which) has not been able to limit production, trafficking nor the global consumption of drugs.”

Support has grown steadily for medical marijuana legalization in Mexico with last year’s Supreme Court decision to loosen the existing marijuana laws in the country.